Among the Ruins
by Cantaria
Summary: God isn’t always in the machine sometimes he’s among the ruins. And even then, he may not be enough. PostOotP.


Title: Among the Ruins

Characters: Remus/Sirius

Rating: PG/ K +

Warnings: Slash; allusions to it, at any rate.

Disclaimer: So very not mine. So very JKR's.

Summary: God isn't always in the machine; sometimes he's among the ruins. And even then, he may not be enough. Post-OotP. My first foray into HP fic ever, so I'm a bit apprehensive. Feedback would be greatly appreciated.

He doesn't exactly know why he's here.

Of all the rooms he could have passed through today, looking for--well, he's not exactly certain of that, either, or if he's even looking for something because there is nothing he really _needs _to find, he guesses or lies to himself-- he can't quite figure out why he's finally settled on this one. It's never occurred to him to enter here before; the room has been inconsequential at best and vaguely unsettling always, thanks to both its contents and its grim inhabitant ("I think she'd be flattered, really; she probably thought she deserved to have a shrine and groveling minions who would sacrifice virgins and baby animals so that Her Ladyship could make the harvest of evil grow plentiful, or something equally lovely as that," and he'd agreed, holding back dark laughter that might have disturbed the ancient deity from years of sleep). _Oh_, he suddenly thinks, blinking into the darkness, _I might be searching for that. _He secretly sincerely hopes he's supposed to be looking for the minion, because he has half a mind to sacrifice the treacherous nasty slavering creature to its god, may they both fester in some sort of hell that doesn't care if Remus doesn't believe it exists. He sighs and shakes his head; strangely enough, it's imagining the look of indignant reproach in Hermione's eyes--_Professor!_-- that makes him reconsider his intentions. Almost, anyway. Without that excuse, why else should he even be entering this wretched den?

At any rate, he's here. He might as well go in. So he does, stepping through the ghost of a doorway, steeling himself for whatever he'll decide to do if he meets whatever may be lurking within the place.

"Well," he says aloud, quietly, "this is certainly something." As his eyes adjust to the dusky atmosphere, he appraises the sad hole that Kreacher calls his room: no, he's not here, and Remus isn't sure if he's relieved or disappointed. Actually, he'd have been astonished if he had seen him-- aside from the fact that he's most likely off collecting more antiquated Black treasures or doing something Remus doesn't really care to think about because if he does he will definitely do something that would violate S.P.E.W in at least twenty different ways, the room is so filled with things that, were it not for the absolute silence, he might have believed that Kreacher was buried beneath one of the many piles of moldering memories, hiding or possibly planning an ambush. For a moment Remus has a horrible revelation: _we're both hoarders_. The thought almost makes him laugh; his hoarding manifests itself mentally rather than physically, but if he's being honest with himself, it's probably as serious as Kreacher's. What was it that he'd been told once? ("Lord, Moony, how do you even have room to breathe when you spend all your time just thinking about it? Oh, you may think that organization is your ultimate ally, but your mind is secretly undermining you-- it's a messy library, Remus, and the books _aren't even in alphabetical order_." Shut up, he'd murmured, I'm trying to file you away. "Oh," he'd replied, failing to conceal a surprised and rather pleased grin. Remus had filed that away, too). He's shocked to realize that perhaps, if things were different, he'd feel something relatively close to sympathy for the deranged house-elf, needing to surround himself with ruins to remind himself of a long-fallen empire.

Despite the astonishingly prolific collections of relics that seem to wobble precariously, daring a dust molecule to push them over, Remus doubts there be anything of actual interest. Once you've seen one lethally charmed Dark object, you've seen more than you'll ever need to see again. But, for reasons unknown to him, he glances toward a small lump in the far right corner that seems to be covered with burlap. He wonders briefly if there's some sinister force that's compelling him to inspect what may possibly result in a painful incurable injury; attributing a severed limb or a violent death to mere curiosity isn't remotely dastardly enough. ("If you're going to snuff it, you've got to do it with finesse. No one wants an epitaph that reads, 'here lies Wilfred Smithtonfordcliff-- he tripped over a branch and died where he fell.'" Well, his name is interesting enough, isn't it? "Nah, Moony; the name's only half of the total package. What you want is something like, 'Here lies Octavian Ignatius Santiago Del Gorbazio, rest his noble soul, he fought valiantly to save the stranded orphans from ten dragons and twenty giants but alas, he succumbed at the very end when one of the seventy vampires pounced upon his neck and drew out his very essence!'" That is entirely too long to be an epitaph. Also, you are completely and utterly mad. "So you say. Clearly you haven't seen my epitaph, which I plan to be approximately the length of a longer novella." Yes, I have. It says, I am completely and utterly mad. "Oh, well; it's better than James', which will probably read, 'here lies a great big git, chasing Lily even as he rots in his grave.'")

He reaches down and pulls off the scrap of burlap, which reveals the back of a flat, rectangular something. "Lumos," he mutters, trying to illuminate the dreary corner. When he realizes what it is, he feels something inside him clench his lungs and force all the air out of them violently. _All of them are on display_, he thinks faintly. _All but_--this. His hands, damn them, begin to tremble as he turns over the object, and shake outright when he finally sees the front-- or, rather, when the front sees him.

"Christ, it's about time someone turned me over! It's dusty as fuck under there and it's dark and there's been absolutely no one to talk to so I've been making up limericks to pass the time and they're quite possibly brilliant but no one's been around to admire them so they'll probably never get published, what a waste, and damn this fucking place anyway, I'm going to _kill_--" The rambling pauses and the voice changes its tone completely. "Bloody hell, it's _you_! Remus! What're _you _doing here? How are you, Moony? You look different. Hey!"

Here, in Remus' convulsing hands, is a portrait of a brightly smiling and enthusiastically waving and slightly manic fifteen-or-sixteen year old Sirius Black.

"Where am I, anyway? A closet? I bet I am; dear old Mum's got such a unique sense of humor, the shriveled old bitch. I've invited you over, have I? Well, I'm sorry I had to bring you back to this festering hellhole. How very inconsiderate of me. Have we done anything particularly traitorous to send my beloved parents into apoplectic fits of rage yet? Moony?"

As he stares at Sirius' animated eyes, his unmarked skin, his still-boy body, Remus wonders how it's possible to feel every single one of his internal organs shatter at once: _crashcrashcrash_. He stops himself from reaching out a numb finger to stroke his face.

"Hello?" Sirius' brow is furrowed as he leans toward Remus, as if he's pressing his face to a window. He half-expects him to start tapping loudly. "Are you storing thoughts again, or are you just blinded by my stunning likeness?" Remus concludes that his voice box has been spared the fate of the rest of his body, and finally brings himself to speak.

"You're in Kreacher's room," he responds softly, his voice remarkably steady. There's a good trouper. "I can't actually guess why you're even here; I can only imagine that he felt it necessary to save some token of your existence, in case his mistress ever changed her mind about her blood traitor son." Remus wants so badly to fall through the too-gaudy, ridiculously stiff portrait somehow, to be able to touch Sirius and not just hear and see him, but he remembers bitterly that falling has not had positive outcomes as of late.

Sirius snorts dismissively. "Her Repulsiveness change her mind? Not bloody likely. She'd sooner dance a flamenco naked in the middle of a Muggle street." Remus holds back a round of pained laughsobs as he watches Sirius contemplate that particularly horrifying mental image. "I think Kreacher must've wanted to wank off to me, the little pervert, and really, who can blame him? It's not as though anything else will let him within its sight. And the painter took a few liberties when he did this-- I look positively feminine. Not even a hint of manliness. It's a tragedy." Remus doesn't think so. Although Sirius has an expression of utmost woe and angst upon his face, he looks completely and unnervingly like the Sirius he'd known--years, ages, centuries ago, maybe. Time's too slippery for him to keep up with it anymore. Or maybe he's never known the Sirius in the portrait--maybe he hasn't been as careful with his memories as he should have, slipping in a version of Sirius that didn't actually exist. It's entirely possible; he's been mistaken before.

But when Sirius suddenly smiles softly and says, "I've missed you, Remus," he knows that he knew--_knows _this Sirius. He can't have created that himself; he's too afraid to imagine anything so perfect in its imperfectness, such a burning bundle of flaws and goodness and contradictions and _oh, Moony, I'm sorry _and _I love you _that Remus would've found it ridiculous for anyone to be so imbued with so many things-- a person would explode. He can't stop himself this time-- he reaches out and touches the surface of the canvas lightly with a tentative finger, right over Sirius' face, almost feeling a soft heat beneath it. He thinks, not for the first time, that no one has ever been so appropriately named as Sirius has.

"It's been lonely in here," Sirius admits, closing his eyes under Remus' touch (can he feel it?) "I wish we'd all been painted in together--James would have a pink corset and those pointy-heel girl shoes, of course, and Peter would hold a tray perpetually filled with sweets like some jolly fat butler, and you would probably just be naked all the time because nakedness is artistic, particularly yours, and we wouldn't want to disappoint the public, would we?" He laughs, low and suggestive, a sound that is dearly familiar to Remus even though it's been buried under over a decade of memories he never should have accumulated, piles and piles of things that shouldn't belong to him.

This is the Sirius that Remus knew, but this Sirius doesn't know this Remus at all. This is probably why he can't bring himself to talk extensively with him. He doesn't want him to know him. He wants him to have clear eyes and clean hair and languid limbs and maddening casual arrogance forever; he wants him to call him Moony without a shadow of regret or uncertainty hiding behind the name; mostly, he's just tired of causing people's suffering from making his acquaintance. It's gone on for years, and their sufferings have become his sufferings, and he wears them like well-earned badges.

Sirius, apparently, has just noticed this. "Holy hell, Moony," he suddenly whispers, his eyes widening like gaping mouths. "You're _old_." He sounds outrageously scandalized, as if he's offended that Remus would dare to do such a thing. "I must've been here a long time, then. You're the first person to find me." The corners of his mouth turn up slightly, bitterly, like a parenthesis, waiting to be filled with something that may or may not be besides the point, and Remus realizes that he won't be able to hold back information for long. "Anyway," he continues, "you look as charming as ever, my dear Moony, if a little more worn and tired. Knowing me, I must be partially responsible for that." He grins broadly, leering, and suddenly shouts, "Oi! And where exactly is my lazy but admittedly attractive arse? I've some catching up to do with myself; I need to see if I've lived up to the ancient Black standard of aging most gracefully and handsomely. Our hearts may be shriveled but our features will redeem us forever." His smile doesn't quite fade the first time he notices the expression on Remus' face. "Moony?" he asks, uncertain. He begins to frown; even at fifteen-maybe-sixteen, even when acting completely and utterly mad, Sirius had an unusual talent for reading people, especially those who were close to him. "Remus, why aren't you answering me?" Then, "_Remus_," a gasped syllable of shock and concern. "What's wrong?" The sudden look of apprehension in his eyes shows he may be able to guess.

Remus holds the portrait up to his face and presses his cheek to the bottom left corner, allowing the brushstrokes of the richly-painted floor to run together and smear, creating an ugly brown spot where no one will notice.


End file.
